Best Fundraiser Ever? Play Arcade Games at Airports for Charity

By Jason Kessler

04.03.15

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Sweden, that magical land of conflict neutrality and bikini teams, has done it again. This time, they found out how to make charity completely awesome. Swedavia, the state-owed group that controls all of the airports in Sweden, has partnered with the Red Cross to come up with a novel way to get you to donate all of that foreign currency you’ll never use again. Instead of just posting clear plastic boxes all over the airport (as you’ve surely seen in airports around the world), they’ve set up “Charity Arcades” in the baggage claim areas of both the Stockholm Arlanda and Göteborg Landvetter airports.

The Charity Arcades are classic arcade game cabinets featuring the likes of Ms. Pac-Man, Galaga, and Space Invaders. Drop in whatever spare change you have and boom! Charity. You get to play the game, the Swedish Red Cross gets to collect a donation and everyone goes away happy. The machines take any kind of foreign currency you might be holding, so there’s no restrictions to the coins you can use.

It’s an absolutely ingenious way to get people to donate. Why stand there waiting for your bag to arrive when you could be eating ghosts?